i put a camera out over a scrape tuesday evening, and checked it today. this is on one little area of my property. i had 9 different bucks and several groups of does and little ones. we have had just as bad of a weekend as everybody else though with this weather and moon phase, but i'd think there were no deer unless i ran cameras AND knew better. just a little fyi.

Same here! I checked my cameras and had a pile of deer on them since opening weekend. Lots of night pictures but there were also a lot of mid day pics over the past week. Just waiting on some good cold weather now

Deer numbers ,I know everyone and every whwerw is different,butt this has been a crazy deer season.started back during the summer.a farmer who farms 80 acres of my hunting land planted 80 acres of watermelons late well to say the watermelons,dint make it the deer demolished them.there were tons of tracks.well come deer season we have got pictures of plenty of does in our green feids and a 5 point and 4 point but no shooter deer.last year we had 8 shooters show up. But they aint here now,what do you guys think has happened to the big bucks,and do yall think they will show back up during the rut .

I run cameras too and that is what has me convinced that our deer numbers are and have been down for a few years.

Could it be that the mature deer are becoming aware of the fact that a camera is linked to a hunter? Thus restricting their movements in that area. You leave sent every time you visit your camera no matter what you do. If that deer relates that sent to killing would it not frequent that spot? I know large bucks will avoid corn piles until after dark due to so many being killed over it. Even though it is illegal it has still occurred.

They will also stay out of a food plot to keep from being shot.

The shooters likely got dead

I run cameras all year too and I can assure you there are not fawns here and coyotes are everywhere and the hunters leasing land around me are killing does when they shouldn't be killing any .

I had 3 or 4 fawns make it with 4 does that are around the house. The does keep the fawns within a hundred yards of the house when they're young. I guess they know my dogs keep the yotes run off.

We havn't shot a doe on my land in 5 or 6 years. A pack of dogs decimated the fawns for a couple of years till we could get rid of them. We didn't see a single fawn or yearling. The other day I had around 17 does and babies in one of my patches and my grandson had around 8.

Nope

I know some people that are not even close to being that smart .

Have a hard time believing deer can learn that anything equals death such as a camera or corn without themselves learning it means death between that deer being shot itself and its heart stopping. Figure they'd quit running out in front of cars a long time ago if that was the case.

They don't have the power of reason. Older they get the more cautious they become. I give mature bucks credit for being "smart", but you're making them out to be the smartest animals on the planet besides humans. Maybe smarter than some humans.

Oh wait, you're the guy that puts sugar in cornbread , carry on.

There is certainly a lot of evidence that supports the theory of selective camera avoidance.

Camera avoidance is real.

I have moved nearly all cameras to active scrapes now. Getting pics of a lot of deer that are not hitting nearby food sources.

It don't mean they can reason that they will be shot though .. I think the click the Camera makes scares away the older wiser skittish deer .. Have a pic of one stud 10 pint with split brow tines . You can tell by his posture when the picture was took that he spooked. Both front feet firmly planted , looking straight at the cam . You could tell he was spooked .. Never seen him again .

I have read this also but in my case we run a camera on our food plots (21 total)the entire season so most of our deer must be avoiding the plots both day and night for this to be the case. We only check these cameras once a week maximum usually longer since they only get checked if we hunt the plot.

That being said I have been running cameras since they first came out and one thing I have learned is deer are individuals. Some bucks you rarely get pictures of and others actually seem to search out the cameras to get their pictures taken lol.